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Dealing of cards, and pressing buttons for DVD Movies and PlayStation Football were the order of the night mixed with “ole” talk as Trinidad and Tobago’s footballers were forced to stay in their rooms for all of Friday evening and night due to the inclement weather caused by Hurricane Dennis.


Only the hotel lobby at the Inter-Continental Hotel was busy up to around midnight as taxis kept pulling up, dropping off guests while others made a good time of it at the hotel bar. The seventh floor though had a busy corridor as a few friends and relatives either dropped by or doors were left open for teammates to join the different “ole talks” or probably sip on some Solo beverages purchased from a Trini Restaurant up here. Some others also made good use of their phone cards on the phones positioned on the second floor where the meal room is also located.

Head coach Leo Beenhakker, well aware that it would be difficult for his “Warriors” to go out on the night, after being informed that the match against Panama would be pushed back to Sunday and that CONCACAF would be prohibiting the teams from leaving the hotel for training to ensure safety on Saturday morning, told the contingent after dinner “You can either take the night off and go to Mangos or you can spend it up in your rooms.”  He said it with a laugh though, adding that a decision would be made the following morning on a revised programme. Breakfast was pushed back to 9am from the usual 7:30.

With the extra day to recuperate, Carlos Edwards was left a hopeful Luton lad that he may just be able to force his way to a recovery and into the 18-man squad for Sunday’s game. He spent the early part of the night receiving treatment from team sports physio Zeph Nicholas in the equipment and massage room.

Some rooms also had the television sets showing the Mexico versus South Africa game on until the weather forced a breakdown in the DIRECTV signal, even before the South Africans went 2-0 up.

By the time lights went out, the winds were strong enough to have the rain beating on the windows and lighting bright enough to make ghost tales scary.

While the fans were looking forward to meeting up at the Orange Bowl Stadium from as early as 2:30pm on Saturday, the Fetebusters crew wasted no time in updating their peoples via email that the tailgating would instead start from the same time on Sunday at the North Parking lot. T&T’s clash with Panama however, according to CONCACAF on Friday night, has been switched to the second one of the double header, kicking off at 9pm following the Colombia/Honduras affair.